BanglaCricket Article

Bangladesh has played 136 ODI matches so far. As an avid fan of Bangladesh
cricket, I must have followed at least a hundred of these matches. As I watched
our fragile opening pair being changed every so often, I asked myself this question:
"How many times have we changed the opening pair so far?" The answer
was a surprise even to me!

The openers saga: Guess the numbers

by Rubu Islam

Published: 5th November, 2006

Bangladesh has played 136 ODI matches so far. As an avid fan of Bangladesh
cricket, I must have followed at least a hundred of these matches. As I watched
our fragile opening pair being changed every so often, I asked myself this question:
"How many times have we changed the opening pair so far?" The answer
was a surprise even to me!

Try guessing the number before you read further. Go on. Just so that we are
on the same page, I am not talking about how many pairs we have used so far,
but how many times we have changed the opening pair. In other words, if A and
B opens in game one, A and C opens in game two, and A and B again opens in game
three, we changed the pair in every game.

Are you ready dor the answer? The number is a whopping 73. Yes, we changed
the opening pair every 1.86 matches. Are you still surprised that we do not
have any stable opening pair even today? Well, letâ€™s not jump to conclusion
so easily based on one number. We have some other numbers to ponder on. Let
us proceed.

Shahriar
Nafees: Most succesful opener

In one-hundred-and-thirty-six matches, what is the longest duration during
which we did not change a pair? Hint: this happened only very recently. So recently
that many of you can actually count it. Here is the number: seven. The lucky
pair is Shahriar Nafees and Javed Omar. The good part of this is that the selectors
are at least making some tiny effort to stabilize the opening pair. The bad
part is the same old story, we never gave anyone enough time to settle down
with a partner in the opening slot.

One might argue that if a pair is broken in between and then the same pair
is brought back, it should not have any effect. The pair will still have time
to settle down with their partners. For the sake of argument, let us say that
this is true. The obvious question then would be what are the numbers? Try to
guess again; what is the pair that opened for Bangladeshthe maximum number of
times. I think you will guess this one correct, Javed Omar and Shahriar Nafees,
a max of 15 times. Since we are at it, let us see some more of these. The second
luckiest pair is Rajin Saleh and Shahriar Nafees. I will make a comment on this
latter, but for now, just keep this in mind. Two more pairs worth mentioning
here are Javed Omar/Al Shahriar and Mehrab Hossain/Shahriar Hossain. They both
opened seven times. This number is not high enough by any means. It juts goes
to show that we did not give enough time to any pair even from this point of
view.

Have you guessed any number correct so far? If not, here is another chance
for you. How many players have opened for Bangladesh so far? Remember, we have
played 136 games. Technically, there can be 272 people. Fortunately, the number
is much less, only 30. That is, we introduced a new opener every 4.5 games.
Iâ€™m not sure if any other country has such a high rate. You have probably
been wondering who these 30 people are and how many times have they opened?
Well, here is a nice chart for you for all the openers of Bangladesh, how many
times they have opened, and what their averages at the opening position are.
Needless to say, their career average can be different from these averages as
almost all of them have played at other positions besides opening.

Want to guess again who are at the top of the list for averages? If you guessed
three names, most likely you only got the second one right. Have a look:

No

Player

# of times opened

Average

1

Anwar Hossain

1

42.00

2

Shahriar Nafees

28

36.65

3

Manjarul Rana

2

32.00

4

Rajin Saleh

17

29.38

5

Mehrab Hossain

16

27.00

6

Mohammad Rafique

8

26.00

7

Athar Ali

14

24.43

8

Javed Omar

51

23.02

9

Hannan Sarkar

19

20.47

10

Shahriar Hossain

19

19.11

11

Naimur Rahman

3

18.33

12

Nafees Iqbal

13

18.23

13

Azhar Hossain

6

15.50

14

Mohammad Ashraful

24

14.92

15

Habibul Bashar

6

14.00

16

Alok Kapali

2

13.50

17

Al Shahriar

19

11.21

18

Sajjad Ahmed

1

11.00

19

Ehsanul Haque

4

11.00

20

Raqibul Hasan

2

8.50

21

Faruk Ahmed

2

7.00

22

Khaled Mahmud

1

6.00

23

Zahid Razzak

2

4.00

24

Aftab Ahmed

1

4.00

25

Nurul Abedin

4

3.75

26

Maniruzzaman

1

1.00

27

Sanwar Hossain

1

0.00

28

Rafiqul Islam

1

0.00

29

Khaled Masud

2

0.00

30

Harunur Rashid

2

0.00

Now, the first and third on the list opened only once and twice respectively.
Since the frequency is very low, we cannot draw a conclusion from this. However
this question must be asked: "Why does someone opens once, scores 42 runs
but never opens again? The same goes for Rana as well. If he had such a high
averagre after two stints, why was he not tried more often? The worst possible
reason is that the openers were changed even if they did well (that is without
reason). I do not know the exact reason they never opened again. I guess we
will just have to leave this as inconclusive.

Some more important points to notice here: Ashraful is not an opener. He, after
opening 24 times, finishes 14th among 30 competitors with a mere average of
14.92. Javed Omar, after opening a grand max of 51 times, still finishes at
8.

What is my conclusion? I have several to make actually.

We never had a stable opening pair, ever. We need to get that ASAP.

Next, who should open? Shahriar Nafees is one, no one will doubt that. He has
the best stats on everything among the openers who are still playing.

But who should be his partner? This time, you probably have correctly guessed
the name I am going to suggest. I know, many of you will disagree with me, but
I am going to say this anyway: Rajin Saleh. He is at the top of the table among
those who are maintaining a healthy average after quite a few innings, and he
will give us the much wanted left-right combination that Mehrab Hossain Jr will
not provide. Also, Mehrab Hossain has not proven himself yet at the big stage.
Once he can do that, he would be my first choice. Until then, let us give Saleh
a bit more chance.

Rajin or Mehrab?

But no one other than these three should be considered for the opening slot.
No one else.

About the author(s): Rubu Islam, a BanglaCricket staff, goes by the nick "Rubu" in BanglaCricket forums.